


look upon the Light so you may lead others here through the darkness

by captaintiny



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Crisis of Faith, Dialogue Heavy, Gen, Heart-to-Heart, Religious Discussion, [rubs my tiny jewish hands all over your fantasy catholicism], give cullen a redemption arc but only after someone punches him in the face
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:39:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22700356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captaintiny/pseuds/captaintiny
Summary: When the tale was finished, Andraste said to Shartan:"Truly, the Maker has called you, just as He called me,To be a Light for your People."—Shartan 9:26After the Herald of Andraste has some choice words for him, Cullen and Leliana have a talk about faith.
Relationships: Leliana & Cullen Rutherford
Comments: 5
Kudos: 15





	look upon the Light so you may lead others here through the darkness

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sootsprites](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sootsprites/gifts), [queen_of_troy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/queen_of_troy/gifts).



> I will take hammer to author's intent and FIX the canon

The Herald frowned at Cullen, and spoke with a tone that he couldn't quite place. "But... the Templars have served the Chantry for ages.”

“And in that time, they’ve come to take the Order’s services for granted–" Before he could continue, the Herald made a disgusted noise and rolled her eyes, before turning and walking away. 

"Wait where are you going? What's the matter?" 

She wheeled on him. "Seriously? After everything, _that's_ your reason for leaving?"

"You're a Dalish elf, what do _you_ know of the chantry?"

The Herald blinked, and her mouth curled into a snarl as her hands balled into shaky fists. She crossed back to Cullen and stood inches from him, her anger letting her tower over him despite her stature.

"How _dare_ you. Are you so selfish and blind that you don't think it affects us? You think we were all born out of holes in the ground completely isolated? I grew up _in_ _Kirkwall_. I know _plenty_ of the Chantry, and their supposed peacekeepers. What do _I_ know of the Chantry? What do _you_ know of peace? You wield fear and cruelty like a slavemaster cracks a whip and expect your charges to survive unscathed? If you cage a dog and beat it for years how can you be surprised when it bites? And your "harrowings?" You take young mages, barely old enough to be adults and send them into the Fade with no warning, no training, no advice and expect them to fight _demons_? If they fail, you kill them, without so much as blinking. Do you write letters of condolences to their families? Do you even remember their names? And if you decide that one of them isn’t fit for the trial, you hold them down and forcibly remove their emotions! Have you not _once_ considered how abhorrent the idea of a tranquil actually is? How egregious threatening people with psychological torture is? And don’t even _try_ to justify it with “it’s for their own good”, _whose_ good? I've heard stories that some poor families promise their children to the Order from _BIRTH_. Preying on poor and vulnerable families so their children can be groomed to hate an entire subset of the population? Discouraging circle mages from having relationships in case they have mage children? Any children born regardless are ripped from their mothers and given to a _chantry orphanage_ to raise and then recruit as Templars. The most frequent cause of death in circles is suicide, did you know that? Do you _care_? I had friends in Kirkwall that were _raped_ and _beaten_ , and it doesn’t matter that you didn’t personally participate, you were silent while others systematically abused their charges. The Chantry doesn’t make peacekeepers or protectors. It makes soldiers. You say Anders started a war, but you never even thought about the alternatives. It wasn’t ‘start a war or maintain peace’ it was ‘rebel or spend a lifetime in slavery and enduring abuse at the hands of our oppressors’! And _you_ would kiss their feet in servitude."

She stalked off, then turned round, stalked back and punched him square in the jaw, with a resounding crunch. The force of the blow sent him staggering back several paces. 

"What do I know of the Chantry, _shemlen_? I know they massacred my entire people in the name of your God. Andraste _spit_ on your skills being taken for granted. You want to be part of the Inquisition? To work side by side with mages? You need to do a lot of fucking soul searching about why you're really here, _Commander_ Rutherford."

The Herald was crying as she walked away, wiping angry tears from her eyes. Cullen was left standing dumbstruck. He spent several minutes quietly fuming. 

_Maker, she can throw a punch._

His jaw was going to bruise and he could feel it. Then he started thinking about what she said and every angry word attached itself to a memory. He headed to the training grounds. Sword drills would hopefully clear his thoughts.

_What do you know of peace?_

He thought back to Kinloch. To the words he spoke to Nina Cousland. He begged her to slaughter anyone she saw in case they were possessed.

He thought about _psychological torture_ and the screams and pleas of mages undergoing the Rite of Tranquility being abruptly cut off as that blankness took over their faces. 

He thought about his lessons as a boy, the pride in his teachers' voices as they spoke of the glory of the Exalted Marches and never used words like "massacre" or "genocide". How the elves deserved it. How it was their fault for being savages that denounced Andraste. 

He thought of the mothers who cried and begged when their children were taken to Circles. He thought of the mages that had panic attacks before their harrowing. He thought of the mages he'd personally seen use blood magic or turn into abominations - the mages he then helped _kill_.

For the first time in his life, he realised that in the moment before they cut their veins open or let a demon burst forth from their chests, every last one of those mages wore the same expression.

Fear. Desperation. Pain.

He remembered one young woman who had run away from the circle because her mother was dying. They'd tracked her down in a barn. She backed into a corner begging them not to take her. There were five of them surrounding her in full armor, and she was alone. Unarmed. 

_"Blessed are they who stand before  
The corrupt and the wicked and do not falter."_

He remembered repeating those lines to himself when he was fighting mages. When he was _killing_ them. He felt sick.

"Commander? Are you alright?" 

He blinked, coming back into focus, and realised the dummy in front of him had no head anymore.

"Excuse me," he muttered, and walked briskly to his cabin.

He once visited a prison on templar business. He realised it didn't feel any different to the circle.

 _"Mages are dangerous. Any one of them can be corrupted."_

Those were the words spoken to him when he joined the order. The ones he repeated to himself over and over. Even here. Even at the Inquisition. He wasn't raised to do good. He was raised to kill mages. 

He once told Hawke that mages weren't people. Her sister was a mage. A Warden now, but–maker no _wonder_ she looked at him with disgust.

_"If you cage a dog and beat it for years how can you be surprised when it bites?"_

He almost vomited as he remembered the Commander who calmly explained to him and all the other recruits that making a mage Tranquil was like neutering a feral dog - unpleasant, but necessary to tame it.

He remembered someone at Kinloch telling him how some of the Templars left books about blood magic around deliberately so they could apprehend anyone that read them.

He remembered a mage being beaten in Kirkwall screaming in pain and using the blood on the whip to conjure a protective shield around herself. Which they broke through. And killed her.

How did he spend so long utterly convinced that he was doing the Maker's work, when all he did was cause pain and violence? How did he convince himself he was in the right? 

Mistress Lavellan was not the first person to shout at him about this. Maker knows Hawke did it enough. What's different? What's chang–

_The lyrium._

He staggered in his pacing around the room, almost falling over as his eyes went to the pile of belongings in the corner that the box he'd had since he was 18 lay at the bottom of. 

The first time he'd taken lyrium he'd hated it, it was disgusting - he remembers his friend Pip vomiting, asking if he had to take it, and the furious Commander threatening to beat him for insubordination.

_Do we even need it? Is it even necessary?_

His thoughts turned to Alistair. Oh _Maker_. He'd never really thought about it, but Alistair left for the Wardens before he took his vows. He’d never taken lyrium, and Alistair could use his Templar abilities without it. He'd _seen_ it. At Kinloch.

Cullen roared in anger and threw a glass at the wall where it shattered.

 _Lies_. His whole life, his whole belief system was built on _lies_. He'd caused so much pain. So much evil, and he’d never _once_ questioned it. 

How did he even begin to undo his wrongs? He could ask for forgiveness from Andraste, from the Maker, but what good did that do in the here and now?

There was a knock at the door.

"Not _now_!" 

"Bur sir, you asked for this report as soon–"

"I said _NOT NOW_!!"

The poor scout scurried away. A minute or two later, a familiar voice sounded outside, accompanied by a gentler knock. 

"Cullen, it's Leliana. Can I come in?"

"Fine." He tried to spit the word but his voice broke, betraying him. He didn't look up as she slipped inside.

"You're bleeding, Cullen." She gestured to her mouth, and Cullen mirrored her. 

_Oh. Mistress Lavellan must have split my lip._

"I, ah, had a run-in with the Herald. It probably looks worse than it is."

"Let me–"

"No! I deserve it."

Leliana arched an eyebrow. She glanced deliberately at the shattered glass on the floor and then back to him. "Is there something you'd like to talk about, Cullen?"

"You have far better things to do with your time," he mumbled, turning away, but she grabbed his chin and made him look at her.

"That is not what I asked."

"I am a _grown man_ Leliana, I can–"

"What? Self-flagellate in isolation and bottle up your emotions until they fester?"

Tears pricked in his eyes. He couldn't meet her gaze. 

"I understand not wanting to burden others with your feelings, Cullen, but shutting yourself away helps no one, least of all yourself. How is it better to break things and shout at our scouts through doors once you can't keep a handle on yourself any more?"

His cheeks burned with shame. He started to shake, the compassion in her voice stabbing through him deeper than any sword could.

She frowned a little. "Would you like me to pray with you?"

Cullen couldn't stop the hysterical laughter that burst out at that. As if prayer could fix what he was. What he'd _done_.

"Sit. _Now_." Cullen knew better than to ignore the authority in her voice, and as he collapsed into a chair, Leliana knelt in front of him, and tucked a stray curl behind his ear. Her face was dark with worry. She reminded him of Mia.

"Talk to me Cullen. Tell me what's wrong."

" _Everything_!" He shouted, unable to stop the tears that started falling from his eyes. "She was _right_! She stood there and shouted and wept and said the word Templar like it was _poison_ and she was _right_! I killed innocent people because the Chantry told me my whole life that it was my duty to do so! I helped torture and murder _children_! And it took someone punching me in the face and calling me an idiot to make me even realise that that was _wrong_! If the Chantry is what the Maker truly wants then I want no longer want any party in it!"

Leliana took his hands. "And if the Chantry is not what the Maker wants?"

"Isn't it?" Cullen retorted bitterly, pulling his hands away. 

"Has He personally told you it is?" She was watching him calmly, as though his whole world wasn't spiralling into the abyss, and he wanted to scream.

"The Chantry speaks the word of the Maker. Everything they do is in His Name."

"That doesn't mean they are right."

He threw his hands up in the air in frustration, and stood, beginning to pace again. "Pray tell, then Leliana. What _IS_ His will, hm? What _DOES_ the Maker want? Did He put me on earth just to suffer? Is this my Trial? Am I failing?"

"The Maker does not make you suffer, Cullen. That is the fault of men."

"Stop being so _cryptic_!" He was shouting now, he could hear his voice getting louder and louder, and his face going red with anger and grief. "The Chantry speak for the Maker. They are _His_ Church!"

"The Maker did not pick up a pen and write the Chant himself!" Leliana raised her voice too, standing defiantly in front of him. "He did not make the circles, or the Templars. Humans are fallible Cullen. They make mistakes, and words and intentions can be twisted!"

"But-"

" _Who_ is your God, Cullen? Is it the Maker? Or is it The Chantry?"

The question stunned him into silence. His ears rang and he actually staggered backwards under the force with which the implications hit him. For what felt like an eternity, there was only silence, and his own ragged breathing as everything he ever learned fell apart and reformed into something new.

He stared at Leliana in wild disbelief, and she nodded, a smile twitching at the corner of his lips.

The Chantry and the Maker were not the same.

...the Chantry was wrong.

The Chantry was _wrong_.

The Chantry could be wrong. And he could still follow the Maker. 

Except.... _Could_ he?

"Leliana..."

She waited patiently.

"How can I ever follow the Maker when I did such evil in his name?"

"I will be blunt, Cullen. There will be people that will never forgive you. Nor do they have any obligation to do so. But that should not stop you. It is never too late to change, or to start anew. True faith comes from action. Be vocal. Be compassionate. Treat mages with kindness and trust, but understand why they might not want it. You keep saying you are not the man you were in Kirkwall? Prove it. Repentance is hard, and will make you uncomfortable. You must work for it, and keep working for it. Remember it is not a goal, but a constant journey."

The words settled over him like a weighted blanket - heavy, but somehow comforting despite the solemnity of the moment.

"Thank you." He hesitated for a moment, staring at the ground, still wiping away the last of his tears. "...will you pray with me?" he asked quietly. "Not the Chant, just -"

"Of course."

Praying in silence was different. He was so used to speaking the words of the Chant and feeling them flow through him. Still, despite the quiet, it made the air in the cabin warm and light.

He felt a calm begin to settle inside him in the wake of his turmoil. He still had questions, and doubts, and guilt... but for the first time in far too long, he also had hope. He wanted to see the Herald and apologise. But that could wait. 

Leliana kissed his head and said " I'll tell everyone you are feeling unwell and you're not to be disturbed. Take some time to yourself. Rest. Start fresh tomorrow. When you want to talk about this some more, you know where to find me."

As she left, she smiled back at him. "Andraste watch over you, Commander."

It was a surprise that his returning smile came so naturally. "And you, Leliana."


End file.
